The invention relates to a processing method for silver halide color photosensitive material (hereinafter referred to as photosensitive material) in which the washing process is omitted, and more specifically relates to a washless processing method of photosensitive material to prevent unexposed area from staining by continuous processing.
In general, the photosensitive material after color development is submitted to treating processes including bleaching, fixing, stabilizing, bleach-fixing and washing. In such treating processes, the extensive use of water resources and the increase in costs of washing due to the raising costs of crude oil have recently posed more and more serious problems.
For this reason, techniques have been proposed which omit the washing process or greatly reduce the amount of washing water. These techniques are the stabilizing technique by multistage countercurrent stabilizing treatment described in Japanese Patent O.P.I. Publication No. 8543/1982 which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 4,336,324, and the treating technique by washless stabilizing solution containing bismuth complex salt described in Japanese Patent O.P.I. Publication No. 134636/1983.
In such a treatment with washless stabilizing solution, however, the inventor found that color contamination took place in treated photosensitive material and resulted in remarkable stains when the total volume of the replenisher to be supplied to the stabilizing tank solution amounted to more than 6 to 7 times capacity of the stabilizing tank. The color contamination or stains are especially significant in unexposed areas, and are a particular problems in color paper whose unexposed areas are white, where even slight stains poses serious defects.
It was found that the generation of such stains adversely affected durability of dye images during preservation, especially under light irradiation.